


All Of Your Flaws

by WhyMrSpook



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Kirk, M/M, POV Kirk, Present Tense, Protective Spock, Self-Acceptance, Self-Esteem Issues, Tarsus IV, but lil cuties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-19
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-10-20 22:44:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10672293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhyMrSpook/pseuds/WhyMrSpook
Summary: Jim used to think that Spock was perfect. His clothes seemed to fit his long limbs and broad shoulders in a way that was almost impossibly attractive. His uniform was always crisp and smart, never creased. His fringe was cut neatly and his skin unblemished, just pale green and silky smooth. Not that he ever got to touch beyond offering a hand here and there. Away missions could be risky business, after all.





	All Of Your Flaws

When Jim looks in mirrors, and he tries not to very often, he sees through his own reflection as if it were just a smudge on the glass. He’s seen himself enough, really. It’s hard to avoid on a starship, all metal and polished, reflective surfaces. So he’s trained himself pretty well to avoid ever really seeing that which he knows all too well; he never particularly likes what he sees, anyway. He sees the starving thirteen year old, bone thin and gaunt cheeks. He sees sunken eyes, a dirty face and rags for clothes. Maybe that’s an exaggeration – more the stuff of nightmares than his waking reality – but he does see the scars that Tarsus left, and that’s almost as bad. The thing is, Jim’s never felt clean. Since he was a kid, since Frank really. His face had always been grubby or swollen or bloody in some way. His clothes, creased or stained or plain old. Frank had only bought them new things when his mom had been due a visit, anyway. So even though he knows things have changed now that he’s an adult, and his clothes and face are clean - most of the time – it doesn’t stop him from still feeling sort of out of place. His youth did teach him, at least, to grow an arrogance so thick no-one could really notice how awkward he was. It serves him well even now – not as Jim, but as Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise. It protects him still. That doesn’t mean he’s okay with it. He wishes he was just naturally confident, self-assured in a non-cocky way. But if the biggest issue he has in his life right now is a lack of self-esteem, then he’s not got much to complain about really. It’s not Starvation. It’s not child abuse. It’s not PTSD. It’s just a side-effect of those things – and arguably, not even the worst of the bunch.

 

* * *

 

Jim used to think that Spock was perfect. His clothes seemed to fit his long limbs and broad shoulders in a way that was almost impossibly attractive. His uniform was always crisp and smart, never creased. His fringe was cut neatly and his skin unblemished, just pale green and silky smooth. Not that he ever got to touch beyond offering a hand here and there. Away missions could be risky business, after all.

 

* * *

 

Now, Jim knows that not even Spock is perfect. He knows it intimately, just as he knows that the soft green expanse of Spock’s back is not in pristine condition. He knows the few freckles of his shoulders, the way they climb up his cheeks and across his nose like blossom blowing in the winds of spring – unfathomably delicate, indistinguishable from any reasonable distance but clear and beautiful up close. He knows the way Spock blushes too – he’s chased that blush a dozen times so far, but not enough for him to be even remotely satisfied. Not enough for him to even consider it without wanting to pin Spock to the wall and strip him. Then Jim, imperfect, flawed, could kiss down his chest and kneel at his feet. He could locate the scar on his stomach and kiss that too.

 

* * *

 

Jim loves it when they end up on a planet somewhere with terrible weather. Not too terrible, mind. Not freezing and wet, because Spock hates that – and Jim realised quite quickly after defeating Nero that he never wants to make Spock miserable again. Every time he breaks that internal promise he hates himself a little more, and he renews his silent vow. But he can’t deny himself a strong breeze. Even a cool wind. Because then Spock’s fringe is blown off his face. Jim’s hair gets messed up too, but his is already a thick tangle of blonde curls that only Spock can be bothered to tend to. It’s Spock’s hair that Jim is more interested in – silky, combed and set so perfectly in place. It baffles Jim that Spock, somehow, is still always ready to leave their quarters before he is in a morning. He always seems to do so much more to maintain his striking appearance, and yet Jim’s never seen him late or flustered once. That’s why wind is such a rare treat – why Jim allows himself a long stare when Spock’s hair is blown about. Sometimes it’s about the hottest thing he’d ever seen, and he wants to tangle his fingers into those dark, soft locks and tug until Spock’s groaning. Other times, it’s simply fucking hilarious to watch Spock try not to reach up a hand and flatten his hair down again, and Jim has to bite the inside of his cheeks to stop himself from giggling.

 

Spock said, once, that he doesn’t fix his hair because to do so whilst still in a blustery environment would be inefficient and illogical. Jim suspects Spock only refrains because Jim generally does that for him, especially after sex. Of course Jim does – he adores Spock’s hair, after all.

 

* * *

 

Jim sees his flaws all the time, in every reflection. He tries to look past them, as if they’re just smudges on the glass, to the figure stood behind him. Their eyes meet in the mirror and Jim smiles widely, pointedly ignoring the way that one poorly healed scar on his jawbone stretches with the action. Jim is starting to see all of Spock’s little imperfections too – the scars and freckles and his fringe that won’t stay put - and he loves them. So when Spock tells him he feels precisely the same way about Jim – when Spock kisses his every scar, no easy feat really, and works shampoo into his messy hair lovingly – Jim trusts that he’s being honest.


End file.
